Uta Hagen
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Uta Hagen |
Bucks County Playhouse productions
The Cocktail Party - Celia Coplestone - 1954
The Queen and The Rebels - Argia - 1959
Internet Broadway Database - Uta Hagen
Internet Movie Database - Uta Hagen
Uta Hagen
(1919 - 2004 )
UTA HAGEN made her professional debut in 1937 at the age of eighteen as Ophelia in an Eva Le Galliene Hamlet in Dennis, Massachusetts. In 1938 she made her Broadway debut as Nina in the Lunts production of The Sea Gull. She played in twenty-two Broadway productions, including the legendary Othello with Paul Robeson and Jose Ferrer.
In 1948 she re-invented Blanche DuBois for the national tour of A Streetcar Named Desire with Anthony Quinn, and then succeeded Jessica Tandy's radically different Blanche for the Broadway run the next year. In 1950 she won her first Tony award, the Drama Critics Award, and the Donaldson Award for her creation of Georgie Elgin in Clifford Odets The Country Girl. She starred in such classics as Shaw's St. Joan and Turgenev's A Month in the Country, and in 1962 she created Martha in Albee's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, winning her second Tony and second Drama Critics Award, as well as the London Critics Award. She has also appeared in many TV specials and several films.
Since 1947 Hagen has taught acting at the Herbert Berghof Studio. Together with her late husband, she trained generations of actors: Geraldine Page, Jason Robards, and Matthew Broderick are among the countless others who reached prominence.
Her books, "Respect for Acting" (1973) and "A Challenge for the Actor" (1991) grew out of decades of collaboration and exploration of the actor's craft.
In addition to honorary doctorates from Smith College, DePaul University and Wooster College, in 1981 she was inducted into the Theatre Hall of Fame, in 1983 into the Wisconsin Theatre Hall of Fame, and in July 1986, she received the Mayor's Liberty Medal in New York City. In 1987 she was given the John Houseman Award and the Campostella Award for distinguished service.
Since her husband's death three years ago, Hagen has taken over the chairmanship of HB Studio and the theatre of the HB Playwrights Foundation. She honors his memory by continuing to shape their school as a source of inspired teaching and practice for theatre artists.